Looove your story!!! Thanks for sharing.

I guess, I was always engineering-minded, pattern never frightened me. But then I grew up with sewing patterns all around.

That is so incredibly awesome.

You are a brave woman. And yes, I have something similarly amazing at home. Of course, I actually finished my horrible mistake before I realized it was a horrible mistake. You have me beat there. You had the sense to realize that the sweater was hideous before you actually finished it.

Hilarious! Especially the graph-paper-on-head part. Reminds me of when my sister decided to make me a dress, (I was like 5 years old, she was 12, I think), and so she laid me down on the fabric and drew around me. Needless to say, little as I was at the time, it was still too "snug" to wear. But makes for a funny family story to bring up at least once a year.

I have to laugh at this because it brings back a memory of what happened to me when learning knitting at school in the early 70s. I found knitting boring at that time and so was very proud to have completed several rows of a blue item (think it was a tank top) on top of the ribbing. The teacher took one look and said I'd done the stitches all wrong - thinking back I think I had knitted into the wrong loop and twisted them. I don't remember what happened after that but my mother is also an expert knitter and I didn't enjoy knitting until my mid teens when I found the Golden Hands collection of Sasha doll patterns. Then I took off and have never looked back. And I think I might join the circular jacket knitalong!

I give you credit for having the courage to try to "create" your own sweater and even more courage to model it for us. You go girl!

Kate,

That wouldn't be the navy blue Wool Ease with flecks of color would it? I am frogging my first personal sweater attempt from 10 years back knit in the very same yarn! :-)

It's so deja-vu -- this must happen to all knitters.

It could be worse! That color doesn't look too terribly awful.

Love ya, mean it, but that IS butt-ugly....glad to know knitting tragedies don't only happen to me!

I just discovered Knitcast last night, and you mentioned this piece in your interview. I can't believe today I got to see it! At least you have something to show for your early days of self-taught knitting. I just have one skein of badly frayed red heart that I kept casting on and ripping off.

too funny!! love this...you go gurl...

bravo! my very first sweater was in that exact SAME yarn, but i twisted every stitch so i ended up with a bulletproof sweater that would have fit a 6 year old. the observant will note that there is no mention of this incident on my blog, though i did do a parade of other horribles back in january... thanks for coming clean in public!

OMG, that was the funniest thing I ever read. Especially the part about casting on a bunch of sts until it looked like... enough. hahahaha!

I've been there too! My first sweater was a burgandy monstrosity made out of red heart acryl-ick that I knit and knit compulsively in the round, even joined the sleeves, and finished the sucker. However, the decreases for the yoke were so puckered that it looked like I had some sort of purposeful strange pattern in a band near the neck. It was awful. Also WAY too big, even though I thought I measured... I think we're seeing a trend here!

I am very impressed that a 16 year old would stick to something long enough to produce that much knitting. And look at how well you knit today! My first project (knit of red-heart ack-crylic) was a midriff top of forest green with an intarsia red heart on the center front. I too had no patience for gauge swatching so the monstrosity wound up too big for me...my mother actually wore it..and I was about 15 or 16 when I made it. Hmmmmm....wonder what ever happened to it? (This was back in the '60's.) I'll bet we all have early projects that we would like to forget, right?

What a great pic Kate! All it's missing is the "ayyyyyyyyyy" to complete the Fonz look. I broke out the graph paper in my early crochet days. Made a template of a sweater shape and just "filled it in" with single crochet. In the end it WAS a sweater...sort of.

Are you SURE you can't salvage that???

Are you SURE you can't salvage that???

Loved the saga, but you're not giving yourself enough credit for the most significant aspect. Your first attempt beyond scarfing was a Kate Gilbert original. Your fate was sealed--in a most wonderful way!

Listen, I think it's a matter of accessorizing properly -- get a funky belt, and you are set!

Whoa. And I thought my knitted tank top phase was bad. I bow to you.

My third sweater was begun in 1990. Intarsia. Eleven colors. Interlocking Greek cross pattern. Dropped shoulders and no shaping.

I knew nothing about fit so the ladies told me I needed a medium. Sounded good to me. I got the UFO out a couple of months ago to investigate the completion of said monstrosity at which point I realized that a "medium" results in a finished measurement of 52 inches. I think it's going to become felted pillows because I'm not seeing 17 inches of ease looking that good on my 5'1" body.

My only consolation is that the "small" was 45 inches.

Oh, I think we've all been there. I know I cannot cast the first stone. My first insane knitted piece was a bikini...made of red heart acrylic...one cup could have housed a family of four. Even if I had kept it, I certainly wouldn't model it for fear of burning the retinas of all who saw me.
It was a great laugh to start my day though :)

Ah, there is now hope for all of us.

Knowing how you've previously stated that you'd rather throw something away than frog it, I'm surprised you still have that! I recently threw away my first item (never did seam it) that I made from a pattern. I really should have kept it and finished it. It was a mint green baby sweater with a diamond pattern in YOs. It actually was very sweet. And I really shouldn't have thrown it away. I could list about a hundred reasons why. But apparently I wasn't thinking of any of those reasons on the day I made that decision.

Thanks Kate, I needed a laugh. You just might have inspired me to post about some of my long ago knitting disasters. Like you, what did I know of good yarn? Also, like you, I've kept these nasty, hideous unfinished disasters for years and have moved them all over the country with me. The first - my first attempt at tweaking a pattern and my first raglan. When I finished the front and back is when I finally realized that my armholes went about 10" below my HIP! The other disaster was a baby one-piece thing that was to have a hood with bunny ears. It was knit on size 2 or 3 needles and I got all the way to the top of the button placket before I realized that the feet were facing backwards!

All that said, don't feel so bad about your pre-poncho-poncho/sweater!!!!!

Did your mum bring you that? Dude...

I think I did a very similar thing in mohair in 1985. But I wore the graph paper around my neck.

Very very amusing :)
I was never that confident to just knit on without worrying about all the details (like how many stitches) ...although that doesn't mean I've never suffered from public knitting humiliation!

off to buy graph paper this afternoon.

did i tell you i have a mullet now? an intentional one?

I am loving this! Thanks so much for sharing :)

graph paper makes everything better.

the impatient ingenuity of your sixteen-year-old self is adorable. i love how you still have this project in possession.

Oh, that's hilarious! I've got some awful yarn from my early knitting days, but it never actually got made into anything (well, if you don't count the eyelash yarn from Walmart.....). And as a reformed cross-stitcher, I've spent much, much time with graph paper, but I have never placed a piece on top of my head - maybe I was missing something.....

Wow..... that's um.... really hot!